Friday, October 24, 2008

“I’m mad as Hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!” said Peter
Finch as newscaster Howard Beale in the 1976 movie “Network”. Are you
that mad? You should be. 32 years ago “Network” documented many of the
outrages and dangers we’re still facing.

In the past couple of weeks we have seen the biggest slide down the
road to serfdom in history. Never have such massive lies and
half-truths been sold to the American people. Never have the
perpetrators been so open and unrepentant in saying that what they’re
doing to our country is for our own good.

Republican and Democrat presidential candidates both voted for the
bailout. We now know that nationalizing our banking industry is one of
the unstated goals of this program. Nationalizing banks happens in
socialistic, third-world countries run by dictators.

But it’s different here, you say, we have free enterprise and
capitalism. Not anymore. Not when Treasury Minister, half-billionaire
Henry Paulson calls in the CEOs of nine major banks and tells them they
WILL sell shares of their banks to the US Government or be on
Treasury’s banking blacklist. Funny thing is, a short time ago Paulson,
as CEO of Goldman Sachs, was helping create the massive financial
problem he now tells us can only be solved with tax dollars that he
controls. He’s wrong.

Our forefathers fought and died in the American Revolution over far less than this.

But, from our couch, as we watch our televisions in digital
widescreen, high definition, everything is resolved by the end of the
hour-long program. Howard Beale accused his viewers of relying on only
the TV for their information and he said they were crazy for doing so.
Howard was right.

A key component in this drama is the mistaken notion that government can actually do anything productive.Government can only tax, control and destroy.The
bailout and most of what Congress and the President do to us today are
so far beyond constitutional boundaries that it’s accurate to say our
Constitution is given only lip service and is seen as an annoying
roadblock to “getting things done.”

Conventional wisdom says all citizens need do is “vote the
scoundrels out” and we can retake our country. Libertarians have
offered a peaceful path back to our roots for over 30 years if you’d
elect their candidates. How well has voting for one of the two old
parties worked for you these past 75 years? Talk about wasted votes.

Economists now recognize that FDR extended the Recession of 1929
into the Great Depression through government bailout programs. It was
wrong then and it’s wrong today. Politicians and bureaucrats must not
force us down a bailout path that will insure our destruction from
within through fraud and greed.

We desperately need citizen-statesmen, not career politicians, to
represent us. Voting for Libertarian candidates still offers what may
be the last hope for a peaceful return to the roots of our
constitutional republic. When will you take a principled stand?